Janata Dal Secular’s (JDS) u-turn to support ruling Bharatiya Janata Party’s Karnataka Land Reforms (Amendment) Act-2020 in the State Legislative Council has puzzled the political parties and farmers associations.

In addition to supporting the land amendment Act, the party came out in open to support for the Act. “Let those criticising me, scrutinise my pro-farmer stance and study our pro-farmer programmes. Being a person who is walking the path of Deve Gowda who hails from farming community and rose from the dust, both myself and JDS will not deceive the soil and sons of soil,” said JDS leader and former Chief Minister HD Kumaraswamy.

A day after supporting the ruling BJP’s Karnataka Land Reforms (Amendment) Act-2020 in the State Legislative Council, Kumaraswamy said “I want to remind such people criticising the JDS that it is this Kumaraswamy who waived the loans of farmers to the tune of ₹25,000 crore despite the limitations and opposition. No one patted my back then.”

Explaining Act’s merit and his party’s stand to support, he said “Ending Section 79(a,b) will increase the coverage of agriculture and go a long way in attracting youth to farming. This will also encourage new experiments in farming and result in scientific farming taking the place of traditional farming. This should be noticed by everyone.”

“ In fact, Siddaramaiah himself had constituted a Cabinet sub-committee under the chairmanship of V Srinivas Prasad when he was the CM to review the need for 79 (a,b) and its pros and cons,” he claimed.

Both the Congress and the Karnataka Rajya Raitha Sangha (KRRS) charged Kumaraswamy with striking a deal with the BJP. The JDS, opposed to the said amendment in the monsoon session, supported the Bill in the winter session in the Legislative Council where it was held up after being cleared in the Assembly.

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